Button-Mania in Morocco

Sefrou hand-knotted buttons

Sefrou--Morocco is going crazy (Hmq as they say in Moroccan Arabic) over hand-knotted buttons. It's all the rage. It's mayhem & pandemonium wherever you go. Thankfully, a cooperative of about 40 women and many families living in some of the most remote areas of the country have responded to the call for buttons and are producing them at an alarming rate in order to dispel any notion that there are not enough buttons in the market.

In a move to quell some of the fears in foreign markets, a partnership between the Santa Fe International Folk Art Market and the W.K. Kellogg Foundation was struck to bring one of the leading figures in the handmade button-making industry, Amina Yabis, President of the Coopérative Artisanale Féminine des Boutons en Soie 'Cerises', also known as the Cherry Buttons Cooperative, to their market, taking place July 11-12 in beautiful Santa Fe, New Mexico.

Amina Yabis at Fez Artisana Expo

The cooperative is taking an ample supply of buttons that will be available for purchase. She will also be holding several button-making demonstrations at the event. If you're in the neighborhood, I invite you to drop by and get in on one of the hottest trends in the country. You can also visit the cooperative's site, http://boutonsdecerises.wordpress.com, to view a small sample of buttons and other products adorned with her buttons, but you will not be able to buy just yet. Reports from anonymous sources who did not disclose their names because of the sensitive nature of the situation have said that ordering from the web may be available upon the return of the cooperative's president in late August.

If I had to write a press release for the cooperative, that's exactly how I would do it.  Granted the rush for buttons might be a bit exaggerated and global markets are not in disarray over the imbalance in the supply and demand of hand-knotted buttons, but I do think the product is one of a kind and like many things produced by many artisans here in Morocco, all that's needed is a bit of recognition and marketing and their artistry would be in high demand.

Along with this press release, I have worked with the cooperative to create a website/blog that tells the cooperative's story.  It's been a work in progress for quite some time so it's nice to see it up and running. Just imagine getting all the info for a site in two languages that you can half speak. Many of the photos came from a guest photographer all the way from Argentina that decided to help the cooperative during her short visit to Sefrou. Thank you very much Jimena for the shots and thank you, Mr. Gregg Johnson, RPCV Morocco, for providing a lot of the history and for continuing to assist the cooperative at the market.

Sometimes it does feel as if the whole city is caught up in button-making. As I walk around town in the morning and afternoon, I see many women sitting just beyond their front door with a small basket, a small spindle, and some thread sewing buttons at remarkable speeds.  In the evenings, small groups of women gather at the city's main plaza to chat it up and to weave buttons.  At night, as the late-night dinner cooks in either a tagine(Moroccan cone-shaped crock pot) or the pressure cooker, they continue to wind the intricate patterns into the tiniest of buttons. In the case of my host family, all my host siblings even as young as 5 years old were weaving the buttons. So in a way at least for Sefrou, it is pandemonium.  My hope is that the pandemonium spreads to the U.S. and other areas where the artistry will be recognized and valued, which in turn would improve the livelihood of all involved in the button-making mayhem.